I agree that not having a test area can be a bit annoying. What would be quite neat is a spam.stackexchange.com which is not search engine-indexed, unmoderated, and possibly wiped every so often, for test purposes. Of course, that'll never happen, but... :)
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Lucas JonesAug 14 '10 at 17:35

@Lucas: Well, it would be a nice idea... but you're right - it'll never happen.
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Nathan Osman♦Aug 14 '10 at 17:59

2 Answers
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Why can't we get a separate site just for API testing? We just need another community site that is not used for other purposes. The scores are separate, so there is no penalty for posting junk to it.

If there is enough interest, we can probably just create an vote for another site...... Maybe start describing and demonstrating specific use-cases for everybody to test against. E.g. 'A question with no comments/answers'. 'A question where same user provided multiple answers', etc. Could be useful from documenting point of view as well. Could even support a meta community discussing the use cases and prime site implementing them.